them. tom brokaw joins us live from california where he will be moderating tonight's big face-off. and the democrats republicans are trying to make the face of their campaign so why does nancy pelosi sound so confident about holding onto her job? and fraeedom, will it work? hours away from the first rescue attempt of the 33 miners trapped underground in chile. just three weeks until election day and at stake control of the house, senate, senate, the whole bit. momentum is heading into the who will control the momentum into 2012? how do democrats hold on? nbc news political director chuck todd joining us from a sunny north lawn of the white house. let's talk about the five senate debates, five states last night. first wisconsin the debate between russ feingold and millions of dollars of big ads.

i don't know what you think about the debate last night but let's a little bit of it. >> he's benefiting tremendously from his campaign from millions of dollars of these ads and i am not and i don't want to. you say you don't want them, will you call on them to stop? >> i have no control over that. >> will you ask them to stop? >> that's part of the problem. it's their right to free speech. >> so who wins that round? >> reporter: on one hand feingold looked like the aggressor. mccain/feingold is a brand when it comes to campaign finance issues. you would expect russ feingold to be aggressive on this issue. you have to ask yourself, any minute of the debate not talking about the economy, not making the case for why he should stay in office to work on the economic recovery and talk about things he was talking about on wall street reform and some of the things where he's bked the

party a little bit. he's got a very clean as far as a lot of populists are concerned on wall street and financial regulation. you would have to say any time you are debating tv ads and campaign finance issues, you're probably behind. >> in fact, russ feingold is considered one of the most endangered democratic incumbents this year. moving to colorado where negative campaign ads again an issue. a little bit of last night's debate with michael bennet never having to run an appointed senator and now facing the first campaign against a tea party campaign, ken buck. >> we promised she could have a dog after the election was over. she said what about that dog? what about that dog? we walked by all these dogs. and i said what if we don't get a dog? she looked at me and said i would run a negative ad against you. >> i don't know.

it smacked a little bit of amy carter telling her dad she was worried about nuclear war. >> i think also ken buck in a later part of that debate got into it saying if i saw some of the ads run against me, i wouldn't vote for me either. it is one of the more negative races. if it wasn't for nevada we would say colorado is the nastiest senate race in the country but nothing will top nevada and harry reid and sharon angle and the way those two are fighting. that's what you got a sense of. colorado is one of those states where i would put wisconsin in there too, on one hand they don't mind some rough politics on the other hand they sometimes reject it so both campaigns are walking a line here where some independent voters may get turned off if any of these ads "cross the line." >> one of the senate races do you think are the tightest? >> reporter: if you would look

at it, the five closest senate races as far as polling, i throw nevada at a six but five that no one talks about as much, colorado, wisconsin, illinois, pennsylvania, and west virginia. and it's the five democratic seats that what's remarkable about them is a year ago we knew harry reid was in trouble. but of these five, we really didn't know that four of the five would be this close in october. if you told democrats they would have to fight in these five, at the would say we'll take that. they look like good states for us. not anymore. all five of those feel like they are somehow the wind is blowing in the direction of the republican. republicans sweep those five, andrea, it comes down to simply nevada and washington state. if the republicans sweep them, they have their path to ten. if democrats can split those two, they hold the senate. >> we'll be up all night that night. >> all week. trust me.

washington state, that could take forever to count. go ahead. >> i want to ask you a bit, there's news out of the white house today and there's always political ramifications. two issues. one is the white house robert gibbs signaling that they are not joining in these calls for a nationwide moratorium on foreclosures. sort of a win-win, lose-lose proposition. you don't know the unintended consequences of the foreclosure, nationwide moratorium would be because you don't know the effects on fannie and freddie and the very slow to recover housing market. >> this is a case where if the financial institutions involved weren't already discussing various ways to deal with this crisis that they are dealing with and the fact that some may have signed foreclosures, the government would step in but everyone i talk to feel as if it appears the markets are trying to work this out. the institutions are making an

attempt. let's give them more time to see if they work this out. it's popping on the campaign trial. a lot of democrats running very populist messages saying let's call for a moratorium and do this. it sounds good. feels good in the moment but you are right. fannie, freddie, so many unintended consequences that the administration is worried about here. >> of course you have nevada and florida with tight races and more foreclosures than any place else. a hot political issue and one final thing. the white house is at this hour ken salazar briefing reporters they'll lift that moratorium on deep water drilling earlier than expected. >> about a month earlier when do you the math. they put it into place in may. >> is this in response to the hold on these nominations from mary landrieu? >> that's one way of putting it. the administration, a lot of frustration, about mary

landrieu's hold, particularly on the budget director and that had been a source of frustration but whether the political pressure worked, one could argue i think it did. and, yes, we're looking at about a month earlier than initially anticipated. >> okay. chuck, with all of the political and semipolitical news. >> we're all about moratoriums. >> thank you, chuck. and of course watcchuck and savannah every day at 9:00 on "the daily rundown" here on msnbc. republicans meanwhile are expanding their playing field as they try to take back the house and that's left democrats making tough choices about where to compete and where to spend money and what races may be already slipping away. with me now, the chairman of the campaign committee, chris van hollen. thanks for joining us. republicans are putting out word that according to their claims

now, which we have to vet but you're the best source to rebut it if you can, they claim you are cutting spending in a lot of races. let's see some of the list here that they have put out that you have canceled ads in places as removed as little rock, phoenix, orlando, kansas city, charlotte, pittsburgh, south carolina, seattle, i don't know. we earlier reported on races in ohio and pennsylvania. how many places are you actually pulling back from because you are writing off those seats? >> first of all, we're not writing off any seats. and in fact we continue to fully support our candidates in a variety of ways. sometimes through making sure we support the state party coordinated efforts on the field side because we know getting out the vote is essential. sometimes when the nrcc or other groups decide not so spend money in a particular district, that means we don't have so spend money in that district.

you have a moving around of resources to make sure they are targeted in the best way. we're fully supportive of all our members in this race and we've been fully supporting for the last 20 months. >> are you cutting money for instance out in western pennsylvania? >> be there's an example where the nrcc has decided to spend its money elsewhere so obviously the independent expenditure side re-evaluates to make sure we hold them at bay. there's a perfect example where there's a field operation going on. turnout will be the key issue. there are always opportunities to take the temperature in the races up to the last minute and move resources based on those. let me say this. what we are seeing of course is tens of millions of dollars of money from the shadowy special

interest groups, secret money being dumped into campaigns around the country and it is a wake-up call to every voter who needs to ask themselves why aren't they telling us who is paying for these ads and the reason is because for the last 20 months we've been reining in the power of special interest. whether big insurance companies, big oil companies, wall street reform, all of those interests are now trying to buy a congress that will serve their own special interests at the expense of the american people. the american taxpayer, the american worker and so i hope that people will recognize what's going on because we have never seen anything like this. this mountain of money being secretly dumped to try to buy these elections. >> that doesn't seem to be inspiring a whole lot of excitement on the democratic side. we heard the president complain about foreign money and without being able to establish the real evidence of what the chamber of

commerce is allegedly doing. it doesn't seem to be a rallying cry. why is the white house and democrats this year having so much trouble coming up and framing a message? >> i think it is having resonance. i think people are understanding that there's this very important nexus between the special interest spending millions of dollars and agenda that doesn't serve the interest of the american people. for example, we know that the chamber of commerce and groups like the americans for prosperity and people backing them have benefited from these tax subsidies to offshore american jobs. we want to ship american goods overseas and not american jobs overseas. they benefited from that. a lot of the wall street banks didn't like the idea that we're going to hold them accountable and the fact that we ended t.a.r.p. which was put in place of course by president obama and secretary paulson. we'll hold these guys accountable. they don't like that. they are fighting back but they don't want to tell voters who is behind the expenditures because

if voters realize that, they won't want to support a person, a candidate, in this case the republicans, who are just going to become a vessel for a lot of these special interests. i think the american people are very nervous about that when they see a group like 60 plus which we know is funded by the insurance companies -- >> let me ask you about your own candidates who are running away from the president's health care bill. let's look at this new commercial for that is being running out in erie, pennsylvania. >> i refuse to support health care reform until it excluded public funding for abortion and included care for moms and their babies. so when you hear my opponents talk about my views on life, know they are absolutely false. >> you have candidates all across the country running away from president obama and nancy pelosi. >> actually, andrea, that ad you just showed made it clear that

she made sure that the health reform bill did not do what some of its critics pretended it did which was say that -- the point is that because of her and others, we made 100% sure, ironclad sure that not one penny of taxpayer dollars goes to health care plans that fund abortion. she fought for that and won that battle. the president signed the bill and the executive order to make sure of that. what she's talking about is the fact that health care reform bill which as she would point out also made sure that no longer can insurance companies today discriminate against kids with asthma or diabetes or other pre-existing conditions. that is the law of the land today because of the health care reform bill. she made sure that she dealt with the issue that was very important to make sure that no

taxpayer dollars were going to abortion. that's what that ad was about. let me just say, look, we have members of congress who support the president on some issues in the democratic caucus and sometimes they oppose the president on their issues. their job is to reflect the views of their constituents and that's what they're doing. >> we have to leave it there. thank you very much, chris van hollen. good to see you. straight ahead, nbc's tom brokaw previewing the debate he'll be moderating in california tonight. the last face-off between meg whitman and jerry brown. and up next, she's a democratic republicans are featuring in all their ads. what keeps nancy pelosi going? ♪ ♪ [ growls ] ♪ ♪

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democratic bill owens who is trying to fend off a republican challenger in upstate new york. speaker pelosi is taking fire from both sides. democrats running away from her and republicans running against her. the latest article in "the new york times" spotlights the dilemmas facing speaker pelosi. this is tough for her. she's become the face of the democratic party. the boogie man. whatever you want to call it. it happens to speakers when republicans try to nationalize a campaign. how is she handling it? >> she handles it like she handles everything with a certain degree of certainly toughness. she doesn't really show any strain whatsoever. and frankly this is not new to her. this is something she endured in 2006 when she was in line to be speaker in 2008 and again president obama is clearly the face of the democratic be party these days. but this is something that she

has really never let seem to at least publicly bother her. >> within the caucus, the loyalty to nancy pelosi is extraordinary. they feel that she has fought for them and gone to the mattress and whatever and she really is in battle mode. >> absolutely. and again, there is a difference somewhat between what members will say about her privately and publicly. what you just said is absolutely true. and yet when you are bill owens and you are going before a republican leaning for many years district you're going to sing a different tune and again that's politics. but again she has been very successful in keeping democrats together. i think her accomplishments would underscore that. again, clearly a lightning rod and you are seeing that from democrats. >> we see it in the polls. 50% negative ratings because republicans have succeeded in demonizing her. we remember that day when nancy pelosi took the speaker gavel and all of the children and it really was quite a moment.

we were up there anchoring. as a woman it was a very, very big deal. so you've got this historic rise and if she loses, what happens? she doesn't want to be minority leader? >> there is speculation she would not have any interest in that whatsoever. obviously she's a good politician. if you ask her that question, which i did, she's going to say we're not going to lose and of course just any public acknowledgement that they are in peril is not allowed. there are people close to her that thinks what you have made history she made becoming majority leader would be a step down and she wouldn't have any interest in that. >> in her case, who would be minority leader? >> yes. >> less fun. >> it's great to see you. >> thanks. >> coming up next, democratic

women at risk on a theme we are on capitol hill. who are the most vulnerable members? a ceremony today in norfolk, virginia, to mark the tenth anniversary of the deadly attack on the "uss cole." twin suicide bombers attacked the navy destroyer. those are sailors and marines. it was making a refueling stop in yemen in 2000. trust me. trust me. ya i like that. trust me.

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in pursuit of this goal, lexus developed the world's most advanced driving simulator, where a real driver in a real car can react to real situations without real consequences. the breakthroughs we innovate here may someday make all cars safer. this is the pursuit of tomorrow. this is the pursuit of perfection. republicans have called this election the year of the woman. in fact, tit could be the first year since 1978 where there will be fewer women in the congress. there are seven at risk on nbc's most vulnerable list. let's take a look at the women because when you look at the women in the house, we see woman after woman, many of them who were elected in the obama sweep

who are now really in trouble. >> absolutely the freshman class as a whole is in trouble. the obama freshman class and certainly there are a number of women who are included in that. there's ann kirkpatrick in arizona and across the country and they are tucked sometimes in districts where a woman was a better candidate because she could appeal to moderate republicans and cross the lines out in some of the districts. >> you also when you look at the senate, you have a number of women incumbents at risk. senator blanche lincoln and senator murray and senator barbara boxer facing a tough challenge in california. we saw what happened in the primary with lisa and she's trying to run that write-in campaign in alaska. >> these are women who were elected in the original year of

the woman which was 1992. these are longtime veterans who are right now breaking the glass ceilings on senate committees and taking the chairman seat in those committees and so the loss of some of these women, even if they are replaced by women, which certainly would be the case in california, the loss of leadership could change the way policy is directed and whether the priorities that women in general would act would really stay at the top of the list. >> thank you very much. and up next, the first of chile's trapped miners are now only hours away from being rescued we hope. plus, activist george clooney will see the president later today hoping for more action to prevent another outbreak of war in southern sudan. clooney just returned with a visit of survives and victim of the genocide that's already plagued that region and he

talked to ann about it this morning on "today." >> do you think this war can actually be stopped? >> i think it can be stopped. i think we stopped it in 2005. we stopped a north-south war. we stopped it with diplomacy. the cia said this is the next genocide if we're not careful. it's the biggest risk. the president has said as much. but at allstate, they pay a whole lot less. in fact, safe drivers can save 45% or more on their car insurance. protect your home with allstate, too, and you can save an extra 10%. think allstate's expensive? think again. now that you know the truth, let the good hands give you a great price. dollar for dollar, nobody protects you like allstate. everyday i eat your soups,

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topping headlines right now on "andrea mitchell reports," in lower manhattan, statements today in a guantanamo bay detainee. supreme court is hearing a case today that could open drug makers to a flood of lawsuits over the side effects of p

preservatives in childhood vaccines. at issue is whether parents should be able to sue a manufacturer in a case that caused their daughter serious medical problems. they say it should be settled by a special vaccine court. secretary of state clinton is in bosnia. they honored a senior diplomat that died in a car crash during the bosnia war. to chile a country awaiting a spectacular rescue operation. the first of the 33 trapped miners could be hoisted to safety in just a few hours. nbc's kerry sanders is live in chile. kerry, what are the expectations and this is still a high risk operation. >> reporter: it is still a high risk operation but there is a lot of excitement here because they think that they have touched on every contingency and

every possibility of something that could go wrong. you see activity back here. this is the driest desert in the world. look at the active with the tents that are up here. more than 1,700 journalists here to cover this including a team that was dispatched from north korea. it's fair to say the world's attention is on that tiny little hole that goes down to those men 2,040 feet. the families are just over here. this is where they've been living in the desert. 69 days those men have been down there. the hope is that everything operates as planned and the way the plan is that escape capsule will go down the shaft and then one of the miners will get in and it will take about 15 minutes to transit to the surface. each man has sunglasses. they haven't seen the sun and it's very bright out here for 69 days. and then they'll be getting an opportunity to see their family, flown to a hospital and it will go on and as they depart the

next one. they believe it will take about 48 hours to get all of the miners out from there entombed situation a half mile down into the earth. >> unbelievable. i'm claustrophobic. i don't know how they have survived this. they are an extraordinary team. the bonding that went on down there and the technical effort to get them out is really the wizards of engineering. i know you'll be on top of it. >> reporter: there are 1,000 people up here working right now fr from across the world to get the 33 guys out of the ground saf y safely. >> 33 brave souls. we'll watch this closely. one of the most fascinating races in the country that we're all watching unfolding now in california. democrat jerry brown battling republican meg whitman for governor. and tonight the two will clash in their third and final debate at dominican university in san rafael. you can see preparations there.

it will be moderated by nbc news special correspondent our friend tom brokaw. tom joins me now. this is for you deja vu all over again. jerry brown in a race. what was the first race you covered for him? >> i met him actually in 1966 and he was helping his father who was running against an actor who decided he wanted to be governor. it was ronald reagan of course. and that was a seminole campaign in the state. jerry went onto be the secretary of state. twice governor of the state. attorney general. and mayor of oakland against meg whitman who was one of the wiz kids of the dotcom boom. a ceo of ebay. made a huge personal fortune of which she's committed $120 million of her own to this campaign. big stakes here in california. not just another election

politically and otherwise. so much begins here in california. the economy of the state is the seventh largest in the world and not just in this country. and everyone will watch with good reason. >> it encapsulates everything new and old and different about politics and in some ways everything that's bad about politics. just what's taken place between these two. they both had ups and downs in the last couple days. what's your personal goal in terms of framing the debate? what do you want to achieve? >> well, you know, obviously we have to get at those issues because there have been notable gaffs on the part of both campaigns. structurally the california political system, does it work in the 21st century. what will they do about the enormous financial difficulties? california has a $17 billion deficit in this state. they just passed a budget after 100 days of wrangling that no one believes in and they think whoever gets to be governor will face a $10 billion deficit.

public pensions, state of education in california, immigration, you name it. it all comes roost here in california and tonight we'll try to engage that. >> there doesn't seem to be much public reaction against the personal expenditures. meg whitman is spending her personal fortune of more than $120 million. that has not offended voters. they don't seem to be buying into criticism of that or perhaps i'm wrong from a distance. >> well, i think what's happened is that people have gotten accustomed to individuals and families spending a lot of personal fortunes to run for office. mike bloomberg in new york for example and senator kohl from wisconsin. a number of examples of people spending a lot of their own money to bring business expertise to the public arena but no one has spent as much as meg whitman has had.

$120 million and counting at this point. it does raise legitimately the question of what is the place of money in these campaigns and that's not a knock on meg whitman because so much money is being spent by groups that have been organized around special interests and it's across the political spectrum. it does seem now that conservative groups especially given the supreme court decision unleashing the purse strings of corporations and special interests are spending more. i think it probably does feed the cynicism, if you will, of the electorate. they don't feel it's connected to the process anymore because they don't have that kind of money and that kind of money flies over the top of them. it goes primarily for the organization of niche groups of voters and expenditures on mass media. it has to be addressed at some point. >> i know it will be an exciting debate. i recall jerry brown was the most forceful debator in an

illinois primary against bill clinton in 1992. the first to bring up whitewater rose law firm issue and hillary clinton so he can be tough in these debates and meg whitman is no slouch either. you have a great challenge and great opportunity tonight. >> we've already seen that in the first two debates. jerry unconventional tactics and flashiness. i moderated those debates when he ran against bill clinton for the presidential nomination and jerry kind of ran rough shot over the rules at that time. a lot of californians have come up to me and said, i didn't think that this debate would really be very interesting but it is the last one and these issues now have gotten a critical mass so we'll tune in tonight. and both campaigns know that this is their last crack at a common statewide audience and on the other hand they left themselves enough time to recover between now and election day if something goes seriously off the tracks for either one of them tonight.

>> tom brokaw in the center of the action as always. thank you very much. tonight president obama hosts a town hall meeting at george washington university here in washington. his latest attempt to try to connect with young voters and rally democrats ahead of the mid terms. mark halperin joins us. co-author of the book "game change." mark, great to see you. let's talk about the president's role on the campaign trail. you have written recently most recently about the fact that they haven't found the theme that seems to be rallying the troops. what do you think the problem is? >> i think the president is facing a lot of frustration and also not a clear message as to a winning message. clear that if you look at the polling data and new round out over the last 48 hours what president and democrats have accomplished is not popular and they don't want to talk about their agenda for next year if they do retain their majority.

the president needs big themes and optimistic themes and those have been in short supply so they turned to negative things going after the accusation that somehow there is foreign money coming into the process in a way that turned 0 of a lot of democrats and certainly those that are looking at the accuracy of the claim. >> the campaign and the way we run our campaigns came up in of all places bosnia today. hillary clinton was in bosnia and asked a question at a town hall meeting about her run against barack obama and why she's in the administration. let's watch. >> i ran against him as you know. i tried to beat him. and he won. and then when he won, he asked me to work with him. now, in many countries that would still seem like such a strange idea. if you're in a political contest, it should be a zero sum game. winner takes all. but that's not how we see it.

>> i just sort of love it. it never stops. that whole rivalry and it's fascinating around the world. >> around the world. you know because he travels so much. people overseas are still fascinated by this notion not just of the contest between barack obama and hillary clinton and that he was able to beat her but by the fact that they are able to work together and hillary clinton is on the sidelines as secretary of state, one of the few positions in the state above politics but her husband is out on the campaign trail representing the family trying to help democrats including a lot who have supported the clintons over the years. >> seven states in the next nine days. sometimes with bill clinton you get more than you expected. this was a moment in morgantown, west virginia, when he campaigned for joe mansion. >> she'll be fine. believe me, at my age rarely

does a lady faint on me. the doctor says she's okay. i'm going to save her reputation. it was the sun and not me that made her faint. >> occasionally he goes off message. what can you do? >> he loves being out there. you can tell. he will be out in the next couple weeks including campaigning in california with jerry brown and gavin newsom. those are two big events over the weekend that he's going campaign out there and sarah palin will be out there at the same time. >> i think she's going to be in nevada for harry reid tonight and there can't be a closer and more important race for democrats. it's just not just bragging rights but at stake there in nevada. thank you very much. >> great to see you. >> coming up, real characters and fake stories. inside the wild world of willie

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call 1-877-904-afib today. the wait is over. i'm humbled by these pictures. kids have been lined up for days waiting to get their hands on this book. >> you can see it there traffic jamming the streets of manhattan. thousands of adoring fans surrounding 30 rock today. this is the day that book lovers have long been waiting.

the release of the first book by willie geist. "american freak show." the fabricated stories of our national treasures. mere now, the man of the hour. the author himself, willie geist, host of msnbc's "way too early" and co-host of "morning joe." i'm so happy you would join us to talk about your book. have you read it yet? >> i actually wrote this unlike some authors. i actually wrote this book i'm proud to say. i got out with my typewriter and two fingers hitting the slide key. we should point out the crowds you showed outside 30 rock look like the ones outside for lady gaga this summer. >> they were there for you. the and i'm so struck also by just reading the book cover, the jacket, you've got blurbs by bill geist.

i hope this moves to willie moving out of the basement. >> you go to the safe place for the blurb, go to the dad for one. he'll give me a nice one. he couldn't be bothered to read the book. that gives you the idea of the support i have at home. >> what did your mom write? >> you don't want to know. we couldn't print it on the back. >> now, what's remarkable here is that you have cracked the code. you have the secret hillary to bill clinton e-mails from the 2008 campaign. and i don't know how you got through there but you've got these private e-mails. the e-mail from bill to hillary during the iowa caucus. don't sweat iowa he wrote. take a look at the faces in those crowds. they are not voting for barack obama. he reminds those people of o.j. it's honky central. this one is in the bag. so am i. love bill. >> i love hearing you say honky central on tv. that'sy agreed to do this segment. we should explain the premise.

each of these chapters is a different character in our society. political, pop culture, the one you're talking about is hillary and bill and e-mails back and forth. took up real characters and made up fake stories about them. that was from iowa when hillary was feeling good about herself before it went to hell in a hand basket. making appointments with interior decorators for the oval office and all the rest. bill clinton says don't worry about iowa. >> she then writes back just lost iowa. she came in third. came in third for real. they don't think he's o.j. they think he's jesus. and then -- >> that's when things turned. >> you have president palin's inaugural address. this is such a visionary book. you look forward to january 21st, 2013. palin delivering her first speech as president.

where does she do this? >> she says i ran as an outsider. i'm not one of the beltway types. i'm not going to give the inaugural address outside the capitol. i'm going to do it with my real people at wwe monday night raw. talking to her people, the people who put her in office. >> linda mcmahon could get there first. listen, if the american freak show, which is not unlike tabloid news day in and day out. thank you very much. >> thanks for having me. >> it's great. it's fun. and buy it. and watch way too early, of course, weekday mornings every day at 5:30 eastern. only right here on msnbc. so what political story will be making headlines in the next 24 hours? that's next.

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which political story will be making headlines in the next 24 hours? msnbc contributor chris cillizza, author of the fix, managing editor of postpolitics.com. >> any time tom brokaw moderates a debate, it's a big deal. exactly. we've talked about jerry brown and meg whitman. i'm keeping my eye on another thing. michelle obama, the first lady, will be in wisconsin tomorrow. this is the first stop in an eight-state tour, closing out the election. michelle obama, more popular than her husband, the president. she's been a little bit reluctant to get out on the campaign trail. she is a mother. they have two young children. she's doing it in the final push. will it make a difference? particularly with democratic based voters? that's where they need to buck them up. republicans are excited. we know that already. can michelle obama, barack

obama, joe biden, everybody else on the campaign trail set the stage for democratic base voters and get them to vote on november 2nd? >> that's the challenge. thanks so much. that does it for us for this edition of andrea mitchell reports. tomorrow on the show, condoleezza rice, the new author. and here's tamron hall. >> hey, andrea. in the next hour the president, vice president, first lady and former president clinton all hitting the campaign trail as democrats decide where to spend and where not to. with just three weeks until the midterms. i want to talk with house majority whip james clyburn live. plus al qaeda with a magazine showing how to kill, using a pickup truck to mow down americans. how this has ties to a radical islamic church. and just a few more hours until the trapped miners could finally see the light of day. but the trip to the surface will

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u. right now on news nation, phoenix rising. in five hours rescuers are expected to start lifting the trapped miners one by one to the surface in what's being called the phoenix capsule. the latest on what's happening on the ground and the dangers that lie ahead. all in a live report from chile. plus, first lady to the rescue. michelle obama is ready to hit the campaign trail for fellow democrats tomorrow. she's more popular than the president now. brett favre apologizes to the team, but still refuses to answer questions about racy text messages he allegedly sent to a sideline reporter. so then what did he apologize for? >> it's between me and my teammates. >> and call it a case of tmi, from david arquette about his surprise separation from actress